You may have noticed I haven’t sent an email in the past couple of weeks. That’s because my wife and I were in Japan, visiting a dear friend of ours. She was one of the many international students we regularly served dinner to here in Sydney, Australia. Over time, she became very special to us. When she invited us to come to her graduation in Osaka, Japan we eagerly accepted.
What a privilege to spend two nights in her family's home, sharing life together. This gave us many natural opportunities to talk about Jesus. One of my favourites was when we gave them a QR code to watch the Easter story. All four of them were on their phones watching the video clip. You could tell from their expressions that this was the first time they had heard the story.
Before our trip, I printed some business cards from StudentInJapan.com to hand out when we were sightseeing. These were great for shorter interactions with people we would only see once -- like while were sightseeing. The website is in Japanese -- a real plus since I only speak English.
(Here is the Osaka Castle -- the trees were not blooming when we visited Osaka)
On our return trip, we had a layover in Hong Kong, where our flight departed at midnight. I was exhausted, and though the person sitting next to me spoke English, we only exchanged a few words before I fell asleep, and he started watching movies. We barely interacted—until about 30 minutes before we landed.
As we started talking, the conversation naturally turned to spiritual things. I wanted to give him a resource to explore further, but the only card I had left directed people to StudentInJapan.com—not exactly helpful for an English speaker! So, on the back of the card I wrote down the website I often share with English speakers: EveryPerson.com, along with my email address. I told him, "If you ever want to talk more about this, just let me know."
Later, my wife asked me, "Did you find out where he was spiritually? Did you pray with him?"
I had to admit—no, I didn’t. The conversation didn’t go that far. But I remembered to give myself grace. I was exhausted, and at least he left with something to think about.
And that’s what I want to encourage you with today: give yourself grace as you share your faith. Talk about what you can, when you can, and leave the rest to God. You never know how He might use even a short conversation to plant a seed in someone's heart.
Let's pray:
"Lord Jesus, thank you for the many people you bring our way each day. Open up doors for us to have spiritual conversations with them. Let us be bold, but also give ourselves grace if the conversation does not go as far as we, or others, want to see it go. Thank you that you are building into our lives as we build into others. Amen"
ps. you can make your own cards by visiting https://www.everystudent.info/
A Special Easter Resource
With Easter coming up, many of you may be looking for ways to share the gospel more effectively. My friend Tina is offering some special insights this weekend on how to do just that. I think you’ll find it helpful, so here’s the link to check it out.